


Mycobacterium Marinum

by berlynn_wohl



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Anal Sex, Case Fic, First Time, M/M, Shower Sex, Virgin Sherlock
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-05-26
Updated: 2011-05-26
Packaged: 2017-10-26 09:41:41
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 13,207
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/281537
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/berlynn_wohl/pseuds/berlynn_wohl
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sherlock was not the only one who was spoiling for a gruesome crime.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Mycobacterium Marinum

**ONE**

 

Not long after the orange haze of street lamps was replaced by the gray light of morning, John awoke to the sound of horsehair being dragged rigorously across cat entrails. Deliberately disharmonic, wilfully unmelodious, the shrieks and peals tore through the flat, spearing -- not wafting, as music should -- into every corner of every room. Nothing possessing a hammer, stirrup, and anvil was safe. It sounded like someone was being tortured. Well, now that John was awake, _two_ people. 

John pored over his alarm clock display and gradually puzzled out the numbers: 0527. Not so early for a soldier, but irritating for someone who had not been allowed to retire to bed until 0234. (At 2316: “John, I need you to keep your finger here. Don’t push down, just create a seal. The glass might warm up, but not enough to burn. This won’t take long.” At 0011: “Not much longer.” Etcetera.)

Wide awake now owing to his old way of life, John padded down the stairs. He’d be alert now until mid-afternoon, at which point he’d crash spectacularly, unless caffeine could be administered, in which case he’d be a trembling zombie. He hoped, at least, that Sherlock would go out today, or become absorbed in something quiet, leaving him to steal an afternoon nap.

In the meantime, he stood in the kitchen doorway and gave his flatmate his sharpest of glares while waiting for the kettle to boil. Sherlock was in John’s chair, facing the window, and so was unaffected by the scowl. He finished his cacophonic fit with the same flourish of the bow one might employ at the end of a flawlessly executed Rossini piece, then set his violin carefully in its case.

“I’ve thought of a joke just now,” John said, “that someone told me ten years ago, about a conductor and a cellist. I don’t remember all of the setup, because it wasn’t that memorable, but the punchline is, ‘Madame, you’ve got an instrument of great pleasure between your legs, and all you can do is scratch at it.’”

Sherlock did not move or speak.

A mug clinked against another as it was removed from the cupboard. “How about a proper tune at least, while I read the paper.”

“I’m not an iPod.”

John opened the front door and the copy of the _Times_ that had been leaning against it dropped to the floor. John snatched it up. “You haven’t even touched the paper yet. I would have thought you’d have torn through it by now, looking for a potential case.”

“I knew eventually you’d come down and bring it to me.”

John separated out the front section and handed it to Sherlock, then went back into the kitchen with the rest of it as the kettle began to whistle.

“I need the Opinion section,” Sherlock said, “for the obituaries.”

John took the kettle off, peeled out the Opinion section, and handed it to Sherlock over the back of the chair.

As he took a step back to the kitchen, Sherlock continued, “Can I get the Business section, too. I think there’s something more to the sharp fall in the Nikkei this week than anyone’s letting on.”

With empty mug still in hand, John separated out the Business section of the paper and handed it over. Whilst pouring the hot water into his mug, he heard, “John, I’ll be needing the Arts section, too. That _Bodies_ exhibit is coming through London again and I need to find out when it opens. I don’t think all those bodies were prisoners.”

John folded up the remainder of the paper and flung it over the chair, hitting Sherlock squarely in the back of the head.

“Very mature.”

“It sounds like there are all sorts of interesting things going on. How can you be bored?”

Newsprint crinkled, the chair squeaked. “Those are all just hints, filaments of potential cases. The data comes in a trickle, which is more frustrating than no data at all.”

“I would think there would be plenty of unsolved cases out there with loads of data. Why not, I don’t know, figure out who killed JFK?”

Sherlock heaved a great sigh. “There’s a notebook on the top shelf by the window, far right.”

John crossed the room and played “warmer-colder” with Sherlock until he’d laid hands on the indicated volume. It was a plain leather notebook with no label or jacket. John opened it up; inside were two hundred and fifty-eight typed pages, with diagrams and photographs interspersed, featuring vehicle paths, bullet trajectories, and falsified documents. John was agog.

“You solved the...So then who did it?”

“It’s all there in the notebook,” Sherlock said absently as he perused the Business section.

John flipped through pages here and there, the text positively singing with Sherlock’s insufferably condescending and painfully accurate prose style. On a random page he read an absorbing paragraph, then two, then three. He looked up.

“So if the Oswald that came back from Minsk was a double, what became of the original Oswald?”

“John, if you just want me to read it aloud to you so you can enjoy the beguiling sound of my voice--”

“Never mind, I’ll just read it.” He took one step toward the kitchen, then winced when he realised that his tea would be ice cold by now.

 

*****

 

Sat at the table with his toast and tea, John had devoured the assassination book by Noon, having paused only to bring Sherlock several items he desired that were out of arm’s reach. To be honest, he’d grumbled more on the outside than on the inside each time he’d done that; inside, he consoled himself that Sherlock would probably soon repay him by saving his life. Again. This thought brought a pang each time he drifted to it. Sherlock was not the only one who was spoiling for a gruesome crime, a breathless investigation, a dizzying chase, and most importantly, a clean finish, the kind that would leave them free to return to Baker Street brimming with adrenalin.

If they could get a case like that, maybe Sherlock would do what he’d done the last time, after wrapping up the case that John had blogged about under the title _The Cressida Envoy_. And by “what Sherlock had done last time,” John was _not_ thinking of how he had read the title of the blog entry and spent the next twelve days introducing John to people as “my friend, Robert Ludlum.”

No, he was thinking of what Sherlock had done the moment they’d returned to the flat. In fact, he’d been thinking of it for three weeks now. It had been abrupt, hasty, unprecedented. Nothing had happened before it to herald its occurrence, and nothing that happened afterward suggested that it had ever taken place. What had motivated Sherlock? What were his intentions? Thinking of it was all John could do; there had been not a word of discussion. If Sherlock didn’t want to talk about it, then it wasn’t going to be talked about.

And so John, too, was starved for data.

John would have to adhere to one of the main principles of the scientific method: Test-retest. The same experiment, the same conditions, the same participants. It would just take some patience. The right murder would come along. It would have to be a murder… or a kidnapping would probably do.

 

*****

 

Being British was all about appreciating the little things in life. Like ten minutes of sunshine. One might step out of a shop to find that the sun had come out, so one could enjoy the blue sky and the hint of warmth on one’s face as one walked down the street; then, one might return to the flat, pop up the staircase and into the sitting room, and find the sun now streaming in through one’s windows. And one would say to oneself, _Isn’t today a pleasant day_.

John put the shopping (light bulbs, razors, vitamins) on the kitchen table. Sherlock was at the desk with his laptop, alternating between furious typing and absorbed reading. “So did you find anything in the paper?” John called from the kitchen.

“The EU is changing the limits on volatile organic compounds in paints and varnishes again.”

The light bulbs and vitamins John left in the kitchen. He carried the razors to the bathroom. “That sounds exciting.”

“It’s often helpful in investigations,” Sherlock said. “A scrape of paint left on a lamppost by a wayward getaway car can get you not only the color of the vehicle but the make, model, and year. The amount of VOCs in the paint and how they conform to regulations can determine when it was produced and by whom.”

“Wow, yeah, you’ve definitely convinced me that it’s exciting.”

“Also, I got an email from an American woman about a theft.”

 _Theft_ seemed like such a small-time word to John these days. “A theft? Like a heist?”

“Not something that would prompt a feature-length homage written and directed by Quentin Tarantino, I’m afraid.”

It sounded to John that Sherlock had indeed not yet found anything that would get him out of the flat that day. He removed his shoes and hung up his jacket, then decided to tidy up a bit before settling in. He started with the empty cup on Sherlock’s desk. And the empty cup by the chair. And the empty cup perched precariously on the arm of the sofa. “What would you know about Quentin Tarantino films?” he said.

Sherlock resumed the fervent typing. “I admire his attention to detail. His blood spatters are very well thought-out.”

“Thank God you said that just then. For a moment, I had forgotten that you’re a complete lunatic.”

As he leaned over Sherlock to fetch another cup, John had only a moment to glimpse the email address on the screen: mthompsonscott_nyc@gmail.com. His heart leapt. A case with a client in New York City? He’d never been. This could be fun.

“Don’t go booking the flight just yet,” Sherlock said, without having to hear John articulate his thoughts. “I’ve only just finished reading the email.” He would have been hard-pressed to convince John that it wasn’t worth hanging about for a few minutes, just to see how things would play out, so John plopped down on the sofa with the most recent _Time Out_.

He’d flipped through three more back issues, and two hours had passed, before Sherlock lifted his head or spoke again. John could tell by the look on his face that he’d solved this mystery without needing to leave his chair, much less the country. This was both impressive and deeply disappointing.

“Well?” John said, since Sherlock was just sat there, looking smug. “Don’t keep me in suspense.”

Sherlock clicked back to the _Sent_ folder of his email and began to read: “Dear Mrs Thompson-Scott: I regret to inform you that your husband did _not_ die in the South Tower on the eleventh of September, 2001, but is alive and well--”

“A woman’s husband is alive you’re expressing regret,” John said, not with surprise; more as if he were explaining Sherlock’s quirks as an aside, to an imaginary third party.

“I haven’t even finished my first sentence and you’ve already begun being irritating.”

“Sorry. Please finish the sentence.”

“…and it is in fact _he_ who is responsible for the theft of your necklace.”

“You solved a jewellery theft? That’s a little…Victorian.”

“Except for the part where I did it entirely through the use of a computer with wireless internet, yes, I suppose so.”

“So…are you going to wait for me to beg you to explain how you did it, or shall I wait until you can’t contain yourself any more and beg me to let you explain it?”

“Which do you prefer?”

“Oh, I like a little variety. How did we do it last time?”

“I think you begged me.”

“You’d have said that regardless. You would never admit that you’ve begged.” John got up from the sofa and stood behind Sherlock’s right shoulder. “Go on, then. Show me how you did it. Please?”

“Here’s the original email,” Sherlock said, and turned the laptop so John could read it.

_Dear Mister Holmes,_

_I’m not sure what the procedure is for enlisting your services, but I have a mystery I desperately would like solved, and I hope you can help. You came highly recommended to me by a co-worker, Andrew Palm, whom you proved was not the man in a compromising video that surfaced some years ago when he was in the UK on business._

John tilted his head to look at Sherlock. “Compromising video?”

“The only mystery left in regards to _that_ case is why they call them ‘adult’ films. There’s nothing ‘adult’ about trying to put your -- well, it’s not important. Keep reading.” 

_Two weeks ago, on September 10th, I found that the safe in my bedroom had been broken into. Although the safe was filled with jewelry, deeds, and cash, the only item taken was the one most precious to me, an heirloom necklace. The necklace had been in my husband’s family for seven generations. My mother-in-law presented it to me on my wedding day. I’m not sure when the necklace was taken, because I had not opened the safe since March of this year. What brought the theft to my attention, the reason I opened the safe on that particular day, was my desire to take the necklace out to wear it. I always wear it on the anniversary of my husband Timothy’s death, September 11 th, 2001. He died in the South Tower of the World Trade Center. _

_Whoever broke in to the safe must have had the combination, because there were no signs that it had been pried open or otherwise tampered with. But the only other person who knew the combination was my husband, and I doubt he would ever have revealed it to anyone else._

_It may seem a trivial thing to you, a piece of jewelry belonging to some American widow, but it is my most treasured possession, and I would compensate you handsomely if you could aid in its recovery. Attached is a photograph of me wearing the necklace. I will happily provide any other details you need, and will pay any expense you incur in recovering it._

_Sincerely,_

_Meredith Thompson-Scott_

Sherlock clicked on the icon that looked like a paperclip. “Here’s the photograph Mrs Thompson-Scott included.”

Pictured in the photograph was a man in his forties, in a classic but distinctly American-tailored suit. He was smiling, and his hands chastely gripped the shoulders of a brunette, in front of him and slightly to his right. She was probably forty but trying her best to look twenty-nine, and had on an elegant burgundy shrug. The necklace she wore, gold with a central flower-spray of garnets, was not a perfect match for her contemporary garnet earrings, but complemented them nonetheless.

“It is certainly an heirloom,” Sherlock said, making a minute gesture with one finger against the screen, to indicate the necklace. “It was made by a Philadelphia jeweller, Ro Webb, probably 1790, possibly closer to 1795.

“But the necklace is the least telling piece of jewellery in the photograph. Look at Timothy Scott’s lapel pin: three lions. Here’s Mrs Thompson-Scott emailing an Englishman to help her, but she doesn’t mention any connection her family has to England. Her husband was an Anglophile, and she either didn’t realise it or didn’t think it germane. Here also are Timothy’s cufflinks: sapphire. Sapphire is a fifth-anniversary stone. According to the Nassau County recorder’s office, the Thompson-Scotts had been married ten years when this photograph was taken in 1999, and Mrs Thompson-Scott couldn’t have given them to her husband five years previously because John Hardy only introduced these cufflinks in 1998. Likely, Timothy Scott received these as a gift from a mistress whom he’d been seeing since about 1993.

“What kind of man would flaunt a gift from a mistress in a portrait taken with his wife? A man who is not only more devoted to said mistress than said wife, but is also confident that his wife would never suspect him of wrongdoing.

“Timothy worked in the South Tower for Keefe, Bruyette and Woods, an investment banking firm headquartered in New York City, but with eight offices around the world, including one in London. A look at the Keefe, Bruyette, and Woods website and I found this.”

Sherlock had the company’s website open in another window. He clicked on the _Executive Profiles_ link, and then scrolled to a photograph of -- yes, that was Timothy Scott, ten years older and now apparently named Greg Burnside.

“Again: What kind of man has the gall to wear a gift from a mistress in a photograph with his wife?” Sherlock continued. “The same kind of man who has the gall to fake his own death on the eleventh of September, then reapply to his employer six months later in a different country -- a country he apparently adored, and frankly who can blame him -- under an assumed name.

“A web search for ‘Greg Burnside’ got me this: an online photo album posted by a co-worker, of a company charity auction. Here’s a photo of Mister Burnside, looking very camera-shy, possibly because his lovely blonde plus-one…”

“…is wearing Mrs Thompson-Scott’s heirloom necklace,” John finished. “He stole the necklace from his wife so he could give it to his mistress.”

“After a sufficient amount of time had passed. Or rather,” Sherlock added smugly, “what he _thought_ was a sufficient amount of time. In any event, I’m leaving the rest up to the widow Thompson-Scott.”

 

 

 

**TWO**

It was not apparent whether the wooden bridge, having no beam or truss, was meant to support his weight, or anyone’s. So instead, Sherlock took one long step across the trickling stream to join Lestrade on the far side of the pond.

The pond, no wider than a wading pool but somewhat deeper, was surrounded by flagstones and pebbles, and, of late, torn-up and boot-printed grass. Two smears of dirt in particular stood out, where someone had dug in and twisted on the ball of one foot.

The body, splayed, face to the flagstones, was the nucleus of the scene’s atom, with each Yarder a proton or electron, seemingly drawing near, only to loop away, then return some time later. Sherlock Holmes was his own atomic particle, drawing near the nucleus-corpse and fearing not the collision. Taking Lestrade’s silence and stillness as permission, he crouched down to examine what, just the night before, had been Curtis Bailey.

“One, two, three blows,” he said as he poked the back of the blood-caked skull. “The first two delivered while he stood, by a man an inch or two shorter than him, the third to bash his brains in after he’d fallen.” These were not spectacular observations, but Lestrade was patient. One would not pester a decathlete who was stretching his hamstrings.

“Whoever killed Mister Bailey simply wanted him dead and out of the way. This wasn’t revenge; the killer didn’t want to torture or humiliate him. He just wasn’t very skilled, so he had to make a few tries. The shape of the dents in the skull suggest a cricket bat; common enough, especially in crimes of passion. Probably came here with what he had lying around the house. Hasty acquisition of a murder weapon means the killer didn’t come here to kill. The bat was Plan B. So, robbery, then.” Sherlock turned. “What’s in the house that a robber would want?”

Lestrade followed Sherlock’s line of sight to the Baileys’ pre-fabricated cottage. “I can’t imagine,” he said. “Bailey was a civil servant, modest means, wife and three kids in a two-bedroomed house. Wife said there’s no jewellery, no top-of-the-line electronics. Her husband ploughed every available penny into this koi pond. It was his passion.”

Sherlock studied the pond. Five koi swam to and fro. They appeared healthy, but it was unlikely that they appreciated the pebbled paths, the wooden bridge, the garden, or the little bronze statue depicting some sort of water spirit. Sherlock got out his mobile and did a quick search for the price of koi. The range of prices was ridiculously vast. “Someone ask Mrs Bailey where the koi came from.”

A uniformed officer popped into the house, then back out. “She says Japan.”

Adding that word to his search narrowed the possible price of the fish to somewhere between six hundred and a thousand pounds apiece. “How many fish were in the pond yesterday?”

The officer poked his head in again, then shouted back, “She says six.”

“Then it would seem we’re looking for a koi thief,” Sherlock said. “But why take only one? The theft must have been in progress when Bailey discovered him. Someone panicked, killed Bailey, and fled with what he had.”

“Fish must be difficult to transport, though.” Lestrade offered. “You’ve got to keep them in water somehow. Maybe he only had the means to transport one.”

“Animals are unwieldy black market items, but lucrative if you’ve got a good buyer. Even if he only had the means to transport one fish worth six hundred pounds, once he saw five more fish worth six hundred pounds each, greed would have overcome him and he would have attempted to take more. Had he not been interrupted.”

In the pond, the remaining fish swam on.

Sherlock stood up straight, and Lestrade could see his expression change from _deep in thought_ to _wrapping up my visit_. “Have you communicated with the press yet?”

“No.”

“When you do, be sure to insist that you are clueless and baffled by what you see as a completely random murder. The public will find that assertion perfectly plausible. The thief failed, either to complete his task or satisfy his greed, or both. So long as he believes that no one suspects animal thievery, he will try again, somewhere else. Good morning.”

 

*****

 

The smell of sulphur still lingered, but it was fainter than yesterday, and John did not detect it until he was halfway up the stairs. Having experienced both in their flat, John certainly found it preferable to have odours fading away, rather than gradually creeping up.

The smell was stronger in the flat proper. The air in the sitting room was warm and close -- like the first balmy day of spring, where it doesn’t occur to you to open the windows because you’ve been out of the habit for six months.  Dust motes floated in the single narrow beam of afternoon light that sliced into the room between the almost-shut curtains. Sherlock was hunched over the desk, by turns tapping away at his computer and scribbling on a spread of notebooks. He seemed to be wrapped quite contentedly in the sulphurous warmth. But that didn’t change John’s feelings about the odour. He crossed the room and pulled the curtains apart to get at the window latches.

“I asked you this morning to open the windows as soon as it hit nineteen degrees, so we could air the place out.”

What Sherlock said next did not sound to John like an excuse for his lapse, but in Sherlock’s mind it might have been. “Thanks to climate change, I have to spend hours every month just updating my phenology notes.”

“Didn’t think you’d be that interested in animal behaviour,” John said, as the flat admitted the outside air and the evening traffic noise.

“I’m _interested_ in things that are _interesting_.”

“Oh, of course. Would that I had a quid for every squirrel homicide and sparrow embezzlement I’ve assisted you with.”

An irritated Sherlock set down his pen so he could properly splay his hands in his signature gesture of frustration at ordinary people that he had to explain things to. “There’s a café I visit whenever I’m in Hampstead. Last year the owner was just about put out of business after a group of schoolchildren ate at that café and subsequently came down with anaphylaxis, pharyngitis, and conjunctivitis. His reputation was in tatters, but I saved his business when I proved that the rashes and swelling were the result of the children’s prior visit to the Heath, where they had come in contact with a colony of Oak Processionary larvae. Some of the more morbid children found them to be delightfully fuzzy and captured a few to make into pets. Or possibly just repulse their more squeamish peers, which sounds more amusing. But a larva’s bristles are defensive: they break off and irritate whatever orifices they float their way into. This would not have happened as recently as 2005; the Oak Processionary moth is native to central and southern Europe. No one suspected that they’d made their way this far north until a man in Ealing killed his wife and children in a house fire. He was trying -- ineptly -- to burn a larvae nest out of the oak tree in his front yard.”

John sat in his chair and toed his shoes off. “I wonder if climate change has anything to do with the weird case I had this morning.”

The phrase “weird case” kept Sherlock from turning back to his notes, but getting excited about something before there was definite reason to be excited was just too much energy to expend. For now, John’s words only elicited a twitch of the shoulders.

“Man came in with tuberculosis,” John continued.

“That’s not ‘weird.’ Seventy percent of latent TB cases go undetected during immigration screenings, and there are three hundred thousand Russians alone in London.”

“Yes, thank you, for that. Being merely a doctor I am completely in the dark about epidemiology. What was weird was, it was not TB caused by _mycobacterium tuberculosis_. It was caused by _mycobacterium marinum_. The man had fish tuberculosis.”

John was slowly convincing Sherlock that it might be worth his while to get excited. “Is he an aquarist, then?”

“That’s the thing. He said he’d never handled a fish in his life, unless it had been handed to him on a plate.”

 _Commence excitement_. “What’s his name? Where does he live?”

“I can’t tell you that. It’s unethical.”

Sherlock sighed. “Yes, you’re a crusader of clinical governance. Now will you just tell me?”

“Why?”

“A man with fish tuberculosis who says he hasn’t touched any fish is a just man who has been touching fish and doesn’t want anyone to know about it.”

“What, some sort of fish pervert?”

“Better,” said Sherlock, and fixed John with a manic, delighted stare. “The Koi Killer!” John was not sure if that was a name from the red tops or if Sherlock had just made it up. Either way, it was nice and alliterative, and John was happy to know he had a ready-made title for his next blog entry.

 _His next blog entry_. The realisation jabbed him in the gut. A new case. A killer.

“I…can’t tell you the patient’s address,” John said slowly. “But, in a completely unrelated matter, I’ve been feeling like going for a nice, leisurely walk. Maybe in…Hackney Wick?”

Sherlock was positively beaming. “I love a good stroll through Hackney Wick.” John detected a glint in his eye but not an iota of irony in his voice.

 

*****

 

Crouched in the window of an abandoned shop front, Sherlock watched the council flats across the street, still as stone. At his side, John fidgeted. After three hours, he feared he was gathering dust, as the empty counter and shelves had long been doing. Sherlock moved only to give John the occasional sidelong glance, as if to say, _How can you be bored? I’ve found all sorts of interesting things to think about while we’ve been sat here. Take these rat droppings, for instance…_

Occasionally John tried to make conversation to pass the time. “How did you know the door would be open?”

“What, do you think squatters are James Bond? Squatters get into places because they’re easy to get into.”

“Then why aren’t there any squatters here?”

“They’re upstairs. Keep your voice down.”

John was despairing of ever having a good chase when a lone, stocky figure emerged across the street. The figure ( _male age thirty 167 centimetres broken femur at age eight broken nose at age ten twelve seventeen twenty-five_ ) was carrying two five-gallon pails with plastic lids, and judging by the way he swung them, they must have been empty. Sherlock did not move. “Is that him?”

John bobbed and weaved, trying to find the clearest spot from which to look through the grimy window, and finally nodded. “That’s him.”

Immediately, a Fiat 500 pulled up, and the man got inside. Without showing the slightest sign that the three seated hours had cramped him, Sherlock stood up and breezed out the door.

“Is there room in a Fiat for two men and a bucket of fish?” John mused aloud, as he followed.

Watching the dilapidated car trundle down the road, unimpeded by any traffic, John thought their stakeout was in vain. But Sherlock continued down the pavement and around the corner, where a taxi waited.

“How did you know this cab would be here?”

“I called for it three hours ago and told it to wait here for us.”

“You paid a cab driver to sit idle for three hours?”

“Yes. And, conveniently, now we can get in the cab and follow the thieves.” Which Sherlock proceeded to do. “Follow that blue Fiat,” he commanded as John leapt into the cab behind him, then added, “at a distance.” The next two words he uttered, forty minutes later in Fulham, were, “Stop here.” But he did not leave the cab. Instead, he watched as, fifty yards ahead, the two men got out of the Fiat and scaled the wall that surrounded the posh house.

“We’re not going after them?” John said. _Call Lestrade scale the wall take down the thieves get good and fired up and then back to the flat for--_

“We’ll wait to see where they go after they’ve got their koi.”

 

*****

 

An hour later, John was at Sherlock’s heels once more, approaching what he imagined was the only abandoned warehouse in London that had not been converted into luxury flats. When the thieves had arrived with their loot, the loading dock opened for them, but was shut again in an instant once the Fiat was inside.

John and Sherlock set about scouting for an alternative entrance. Every ground-floor door and window was locked or boarded up, but John pointed out the fire escape. The landing spanned twenty feet on either side of the stairs, and there were no doors but arched windows, large enough for a man to pass through and with most of the glass broken out. But the stairs, typically but inconveniently, ended ten feet from the ground. Sherlock continued to scout until he spied a broken palette in a rubbish heap. With John helping brace it against the wall, Sherlock could climb it and easily reach the grate beneath the bottom stair, and hoist himself up. He did not turn back to help John up, but peered in the nearest window and then manoeuvred himself inside it.

John shoved the palette against the wall, trying to wedge it so he could climb up safely. But once he had put one hand on the grating, Sherlock’s arm shot out of the window, palm out, and he waved John back down.

Inside, Sherlock was tenuously crouched on a railing that circled the interior of the warehouse. The corresponding walkway had been removed. It was a balancing act, but where he was perched, he was shrouded in darkness. Below, under portable halogen flood lights, three men whom Sherlock had not previously seen were dumping the bucket of koi into a metal tank ten feet wide. Two were armed; Sherlock could tell by their strides and the way their elbows were bent. Nearby, exotic reptiles languished in too-small terrariums.

“What’s going on?” John whispered.

“We’ve found it.” Sherlock hissed, leaning toward the window while fumbling in his pocket. “I’m just going to text Lestrade--oop.”

_Clang._

_Clang-clang._

_Clang._

“Oi! Who’s up there?”

Sherlock tumbled back out onto the landing, grabbed the edge of the grate, and swung himself onto the pavement. “My mobile!” he cursed as they took off running. “ _Stupid!_ ”

As they rounded the corner, they heard the clacking of the door to the loading dock being opened. Three men, shabbily dressed and with caps pulled down low, darted out after them. John was a little light-headed already. _Gruesome crime? Check. Breathless investigation? Close enough. Dizzying chase? Sort of expected_ we’d _end up chasing_ them _, but check nonetheless. Keep up the good work, London._

 

*****

 

Twelve minutes later, the following conversation took place inside a rubbish skip in Shoreditch:

“John?”

“Yeah?”

“I need to use your phone to send a text.”

“I know.”

“Then why are you just sitting there?”

“I’m afraid to put my hand in my coat pocket in case I find a rat.”

“John, the odds of that happening to you twice in four months must be astoundingly low.”

 

 

**THREE**

They didn’t smell too bad, for having been holed up in a rubbish skip for an hour and a half. Which was good, else they might have been refused a cab ride. Sherlock had kept himself occupied in the skip, texting Lestrade until the Met had arrived at the warehouse and apprehended the thugs. Lestrade readily promised to find Sherlock’s mobile and return it, but was less enthusiastic about paying the cab driver, who, obeying Sherlock’s orders, had now been running his meter for seven hours and was asking for two hundred and thirty-seven pounds. John, meanwhile, had spent the ninety minutes in a state of alternate disgust (at their location) and anticipation (of what could still very well happen later on).

Back at Baker Street, as John paid the driver (just ten quid for this one) and climbed out of the cab, Sherlock was still periodically giggling to himself about their escape from the Koi Kidnappers (somewhat lower in criminal rank than the Koi Killer, but appealingly alliterative nonetheless). Giggling was good. Giggling meant adrenalin.

John couldn’t help giggling too, through the door and all the way up the stairs and into the sitting room. He cut ahead of Sherlock after paying the cabbie, so he could get up the stairs first, cut Sherlock off just inside the doorway, keep him from making his way in and finding some other way to expend his excess energy. As he did so, John thought, _Erg, that was rather awkward. Why do I try to do things that I know Sherlock will see through in an instant? Too late now_. But Sherlock said nothing, and continued to giggle even as he found himself blocked and staring down a breathless John with an expectant look on his face. Then the giggling stopped.

Without a word, Sherlock took the remaining half-step forward and did the same thing he had done before: undid John’s belt and zip, then plunged his hand into John’s trousers, grabbing at John’s cock like it belonged to him.

John reciprocated, albeit with less finesse, working at Sherlock’s button and zip for several seconds. It was positively tropical inside Sherlock’s trousers. His cock was sweat-damp and hard as glass, twitching in time with his racing heartbeat. Without the shock and bafflement of the previous encounter, there was room for a greater feeling of weirdness and vulnerability. He felt more exposed this time; Sherlock had not urged him against the wall, like he had before, so they were just standing in the middle of the floor, illuminated by the UV light from the kitchen, with nothing to lean against, nothing to brace themselves on, just clutching at each other’s genitals.

The first time, after pinning John to the door, Sherlock had jerked him so fast he barely knew what was going on. Afterward, John had returned the favour, initially because it seemed rude not to, but as he went about it he felt a thrill almost as great as when he’d been receiving. Now they were trying to do it simultaneously, which was clumsy and stupid, because Sherlock was right-handed and John was left-handed. Their wrists knocked against each other. Fed up, John grabbed Sherlock’s right arm and yanked it away. Then, to show he hadn’t done it out of a sudden change of heart, he shoved both hands down Sherlock’s trousers, one to work his shaft and one to roll and rub his balls. Chastened, Sherlock did not lean or sway, just huffed and stood stock-still with shoulders squared, and let John go to work. Occasionally his head tilted and his mouth opened slightly, but a moment later he’d regain his composure.

Everything was so exciting, John almost got lost in it again, floating, no, _soaring_ on the chemicals his adrenal medulla was producing. But his rational mind somehow managed to get a word in. For days John had told himself he was going to _slow down_ and _pay attention_ when this happened again. He was going to remember the feel of Sherlock, what kind of touches could make his breathing more rapid or more ragged (just about all of them, now that he was trying to keep track). He was going to listen to the noises Sherlock made. He was going to _enjoy_ Sherlock.

From an anatomical standpoint, though, things were getting out of control. Everything was getting more sweat-slick by the second, and John could barely keep a grip on Sherlock’s cock. _What can I do to speed this up_ , John thought. _Maybe I should kiss him…?_

Too late. When he came, Sherlock shut his mouth abruptly and exhaled powerfully three times through his nostrils, as if determined to retain some semblance of dignity. (Determined but failing, John felt.) John’s slippery strokes turned obscenely noisy and wet as Sherlock’s come poured down his fist. Sherlock waited not one second after the last weak pulse trickled over John’s index finger before he pushed John’s arms to the side to get a clear path to his cock.

John wanted to brace himself on Sherlock’s shoulders, but he dared not defile Sherlock’s coat with his sticky hands. So he just stood there like an idiot and took it, not knowing what else to do. He tried to feel out clues as to what Sherlock’s inclinations were, his past. Was he suspiciously skilled at this? No. Was he remarkably clumsy? Not that, either. Was he passionate, or perfunctory? The latter, John managed to suppose, just before he came with an embarrassing yelp and a twist of his spine.

And then Sherlock’s hands were gone, and only their breath touched each other.

John no longer had to wonder if what had happened between them before had been a fluke. He supposed he could think of it now as a personality quirk: sometimes Sherlock climbed over the furniture; sometimes Sherlock asked John to hand him things when John wasn’t there; sometimes Sherlock wanted him and John to jerk each other off after a case.

Sherlock, still feeling the rush, refused to make eye contact now, though he didn’t seem in a hurry to move on to the next activity. It was as if he was trapped in John’s orbit; he swayed slightly but stayed where he was. His eyes darted about as though he were tracking something on the ceiling. His chest heaved, and he emitted a tiny noise with each exhalation. John had seen him appear more composed when he was being strangled.

Sherlock put himself away and did up his trousers, then, finally, backed away from John like he’d been ordered to, with a gesture of surrender. “You can have the shower first,” he said.

John zipped his trousers and staggered forward to close the distance Sherlock had created. He put two fingers on Sherlock’s elbow and, contrary to what Sherlock seemed to want, their gazes touched.

“What if we both go in the shower? Together.” John’s heart hammered so hard in his ribcage he thought the suspense might literally kill him, while Sherlock, otherwise motionless, averted his eyes to stare at a spot somewhere beyond John’s right ear. After a torturously elongated moment, he nodded to that spot, took John’s arm, and led him.

 

*****

 

More adrenalin flooded John’s system as they headed for the bathroom, as he was now panicking again: he had no idea what the protocols were for a delirious but gradually lengthening sexual encounter with a flatmate. When you get to the shower, do you take each other’s clothes off, or just do your own? What do you do while you’re waiting for the water to get hot? Wait -- you can turn the shower on, then do the clothes part while the water warms up. But then who -- well, now here was Sherlock with the answer to that one. He was already out of his coat, scarf, shoes, socks, and shirt before his feet hit the bathroom tiles. He started the water, then shucked his trousers and boxers in one go. The look he gave John made him feel silly for still being dressed. John pulled at his clothes while Sherlock, unconcerned about the still-cold water, stepped into the tub.

By the time John got in, the water had warmed considerably. The two of them stood there looking at each other like they’d just travelled through a time warp and were unsure of how they’d arrived there. It eventually occurred to John to reach for the soap. It was a relief to have something besides Sherlock’s body to concentrate on for just five seconds, so he could get his bearings. The thought occurred: _Do the scars thing_. He worked up a thick, fragrant lather with both hands and, setting the soap aside, began to rub Sherlock’s shoulders and chest. “In the past,” he said, “when I found myself naked with someone for the first time, it seems like always, the first thing we did was compare scars. Just tell each other stories about where we got them.”

Sherlock was nonplussed; he had obviously never played this game before. “You and I would be in here all night.”

“I know, it’s kind of different for us.” John cringed at his suggestion going over so badly. He worked his foamy way down to Sherlock’s belly, then went for more soap. “But how about you just pick one, and tell me about it.”

Sherlock contemplated for a moment, then stopped John’s ministrations. He brushed his hair away from his ear and pointed to a short, pale, barely-visible surgical incision that had been made just below where ear met neck. “I’ll show you this one, because it might be important one day. Mastoid operation when I was eight. Affected my hearing a little in this ear. But it’s not just a scar. Part of the mastoid bone is gone, as well. I want you to know this, in case you’re presented with my corpse one day and are told that I am dead. I could be burnt to a crisp and have had my teeth knocked out, so a positive identification might not be possible, but you might be told it’s me. I might have had to fake my own death, or someone might fake my death to get to you. Now you know: if you don’t see this scar or the hole in my skull, it’s not actually me.”

John felt a bit ill, suddenly. “I know I’m the one that suggested this, but that is really not what I had in mind.” He had intended for the game to serve the same purpose that it did for regular people: a way for a couple to exhibit, examine, discuss, and familiarise themselves with each other’s bodies in a not-so-sexual way, as a stepping stone to intimacy. But that had pretty much gotten away from him here.

“You tell me a story, then,” Sherlock ordered. “Since I obviously don’t know how this is done.”

“No need to be touchy. Here, you do me.” He passed the bar of soap to Sherlock and then turned around. Sherlock dutifully lathered John’s shoulders and back while he explained the three parallel scars over his right elbow. “It’s very simple: I was attacked by a neighbour’s dog when I was ten. It was a big Rottweiler. It made like it was going to tackle me, and I put my arms up to protect my face, but it just clawed me, it didn’t bite. My friend said it was just trying to be friendly, like to put its paws up on my shoulders. I had to go to hospital and have all sorts of horrible shots and things for tetanus. Anyway, that’s how it’s done,” he finished lamely, and turned back around to rinse himself and take the soap. There was more of Sherlock to wash.

For all that he had handled Sherlock’s cock, gripped it, felt it flutter and jerk, John hadn’t actually _seen_ it until just now. It was nothing extraordinary, but still as fine a specimen as John had ever laid eyes on, darker than the rest of Sherlock’s skin, with a pouting foreskin thin enough to reveal the contours of the ridge and tapered head. His pubic hair was as immaculately groomed as the rest of him, but retained a natural shape and appearance.

John scrubbed Sherlock’s genitals with clinical technique and efficiency. He didn’t want to just have another mutual wank here in the shower; he would save his teasing strokes for later. He couldn’t help, though, lingering when he pulled Sherlock’s foreskin back to clean underneath, using just the tips of his soapy fingers, letting one carefully caress the slit. Sherlock held onto John’s shoulders with both hands.

When he handed the soap back, Sherlock imitated his mostly clinical methods in turn, but it did still feel quite nice. Ticklish, when the blade of Sherlock’s hand slid into his femoral crease.

When it was John’s turn to lather again, he nudged the insides of Sherlock’s arms. “Lift up,” he said, and Sherlock stretched his arms above his head. After taking one and a half seconds to admire the suggestively stretched form, John started working the soap into the fuzzy hollows of Sherlock’s armpits. He was nearly overwhelmed by a sudden urge to find out if Sherlock was ticklish, but good sense prevailed: a slippery tub was no place to confirm his suspicion, and anyway it would reflect badly on John to take advantage of Sherlock’s trust by administering humiliating sensory torment.

He continued upwards, soaping Sherlock’s arms until he could reach no higher, then slid his hands down and across Sherlock’s ribcage and around back to his spine, so they were in a sort of hug. “You can drop your arms now,” he said.

John dropped his own hands until he cupped one round, soapy buttock in each palm, then drew his left hand back up and slid the first two fingers over and into the cleft. Sherlock’s whole body tensed, and John could feel a sudden fear radiating from him. He kept his hand still.

“Is this not okay? Do you not like to be touched there?”

He leaned back to examine Sherlock’s face, and saw the _learning_ expression. Sherlock would rarely admit that he hadn’t previously known something, but John had grown to recognise the look that came over him, particularly when he realised he’d made a social _faux pas_ in John’s presence. But what did the look mean now? That Sherlock didn’t know people were supposed to like that kind of touch? One would have to be very naïve -- or have suffered some kind of trauma -- not to understand that. John hoped for the former, but didn’t ask. Sherlock would give up that information or he wouldn’t, based on its perceived relevance.

This time, Sherlock volunteered nothing verbally. But he slowly raised and lowered himself once on the balls of his feet, which had the effect of sliding John’s fingers -- still in place -- up and down slightly. John took his cue and let his hand follow the inner curve of Sherlock’s buttock, slow and gentle. On the fourth downstroke, his index finger teased the opening, just making a little circle. His middle finger pressed somewhat more insistently against Sherlock’s perineum. Meanwhile, Sherlock’s knees were turning to water.

“Got to get you nice and clean all over,” John said encouragingly. He could feel how serious things had turned, all of a sudden.

“Yes,” Sherlock whispered. John may not have heard him over the sound of the shower spray. He leaned against John as much as he dared in this cramped, slippery environment.

“Nice and clean,” John repeated, pleasing himself by pleasing Sherlock. He was using all four fingers now to boldly slide up and down.

When Sherlock took the soap in hand and tentatively returned the favour, John’s synapses fired with all sorts of conflicting signals. Maybe Sherlock was trying to tell him that it was _his_ body that would need to be “clean all over” that evening. Well, they could negotiate later. Or perhaps Sherlock was just reciprocating to be polite. _Ha. Sherlock, reciprocate, polite_. For now John just enjoyed the touch.

Between all these soapy caresses and whispered suggestions, however, the part John liked best turned out to be when Sherlock bent his knees to get low and under the showerhead so he could wet his hair. He closed his eyes and his jaw dropped open, and though the majority of the water soaked his curls and laid them flat, rogue trickles made their way across his forehead, over his cheekbones, down the tendons of his neck, into the hollows over his collarbones, all the way down his chest and belly, and into his pubic hair. John vowed to do his best imitation of a drop of water later that night.

John hummed. “I don’t know about you,” he said, “but I spend about a third of my time in the shower just mentally preparing myself to turn the warm water off and step out into the cold air.”

In response, Sherlock immediately reached down and turned the water off.

And so, defiantly, John stepped out of the tub first, not allowing himself to shiver. He let Sherlock take a few seconds to shake the water from his hair before stepping out in turn. With this spare moment he opened the cupboard under the sink and felt around for that canvas bag of seldom-used items -- the bar of soap that he ended up not liking the smell of but couldn’t throw out because that would be wasteful; the oddly-shaped plasters from a variety pack, the ones for fingertips and knuckles; and so on -- and rummaged until he found the pump-bottle he sought.

Behind him, Sherlock stepped out and pulled a towel off the rack. “What’s that for?” he said, indicating the bottle.

“For later,” John replied, because fortune favours the bold. He set the bottle on the counter and took the towel from Sherlock to rub him dry. He would not miss a second opportunity to get his hands near, onto, or into Sherlock’s private areas, even through terrycloth. It felt far naughtier than it would have if he were administering comparable touches to someone who...was not Sherlock Holmes.

 

*****

“Shall we go to my room?”

“That would be better. Yours probably doesn’t smell strongly of yellow phosphorous.” When Sherlock saw John’s expression, he added, “Don’t worry about it.”

“What are you even _doing_? Sherlock, that stuff will literally melt your face off.”

“I said don’t worry about it.”

 

 

**FOUR**

John, familiar with the layout of the room even in the dark, put the pump-bottle on the bedside table before he flicked on the lamp, revealing precisely the sort of neat, orderly bedroom one would expect him to have. For a brief moment, the two men stood there beside the bed, not sure what to do next, or rather, fairly certain about what should happen next but not sure how to go about it.

“Oh,” John said, “I suppose I should have asked. Do you, er, do you like doing it better with the lights on or off?”

“The lights?” Sherlock twisted around for an instant to look at the lamp, and gave the game away. That brief, nervous turn and purposeless glance at the light was only to buy time. That was the only reason for Sherlock to ever do anything nervously or without purpose.

“Yes, the lights,” John said with careful nonchalance. He took a step closer to Sherlock and put his hands on Sherlock’s hips. “When you’ve slept with people in the past, did you prefer the lights on or off?”

“On, of course,” Sherlock lied. “It’s like anything else. I can’t get the job done if I can’t see everything.”

John nodded at this, sort of to himself. That actually was an insightful prediction, on Sherlock’s part, of his potential preference. But realising this about Sherlock, John felt time slowing down, felt the air get heavier around them. Sherlock had only wanted an occasional silent adrenalin-fuelled handjob in the sitting room, and now look what John had done.

He held one of Sherlock’s arms tightly and pulled him down onto the bed. He felt a momentary, sinister urge to ask Sherlock prying questions, about other preferences he harboured, to hear what kind of answers he would make up, or to get him to admit to his lack of experience. Not because it would be amusing (though it likely would be), but because it was so rare to see him showing any weakness. John put this urge away, though; it would be the emotional equivalent of tickling him.

It then occurred to him that it would be even more fun to just start learning what his actual preferences were, through practical experience. So, stretched out at Sherlock’s side, he set to work, with long caresses of the flat of his hand and teasing touches of his fingertips, his intention being to continue until he felt Sherlock shiver or sigh.

His wait time was approximately nil. Sherlock responded exquisitely to every touch, his body succumbing to subtle, involuntary twists and undulations as John’s hands skimmed, rubbed, and pressed. He also seemed unable to stop the tiny sighs and hitches of breath that escaped. His determination to remain composed and dignified was vanishing.

Though he appreciated the avalanche of positive feedback. John was not sure if he owed this to sensitive skin or a very sensitive brain. Perhaps, just as Sherlock absorbed every visual detail instantaneously, and correctly interpreted every word and intonation in every conversation, his skin might also absorb information at a rate unfathomable to most people.  Or, perhaps, not to flatter himself, but all this might have been further evidence of the abstruse but nonetheless extraordinary effect that John had on Sherlock -- someone else might touch him in the same way and he might remain unmoved, because only with John would he let himself unravel like this. This possibility excited John. He wanted to push it further, see what else he could do to Sherlock, see how exceptional he really was. But long minutes passed and Sherlock, it seemed, still had not even gotten over the novelty of John’s soft, simple touches.

“You’re being very quiet,” John murmured, which was his nice way of saying _Would you please give me a clue about what to do to you next_.

Sherlock finished a long, scrumptious sigh before saying, “I thought I was making plenty of noise just then.”

“You’re not being very _talkative_.” John pushed himself up and swung one leg over Sherlock’s body, to straddle him. He lowered himself, gently, still bracing himself on elbows and knees, so he could press as much of himself to Sherlock as possible without crushing him. Sherlock put his arms around John, not around his waist but up and over his shoulders. John’s lips brushed Sherlock’s throat as he spoke, barely above a whisper:

“I don’t want to spoil this with a lot of chatter, but we have to be absolutely clear about what’s going on. I want to be inside you. Do you want that?”

Beneath his lips, John could feel a deep swallow and the bobbing of Sherlock’s adam’s apple, but Sherlock said nothing. Gently, almost imperceptibly, he pulled John closer to him.

“You don’t know yet,” John said. “That’s alright. We can find out together, then.”

John wanted the feeling of getting his knees between Sherlock’s and spreading Sherlock’s legs with his own, but he wasn’t sure that “forceful and intimidating” was the path to success at the moment. Instead, he shifted himself to one side and pressed a hand to Sherlock’s thigh, murmuring, “You’ve got to spread these for me.” Sherlock complied, and once John could get both knees between Sherlock’s, he placed his thumbs on the insides of Sherlock’s thighs to open them a little more, not all the way, not as much as he would need to, but enough to make a point.

“I think this is how I’ll do it. Not yet, but in a little while, this is how it will be. You can think about that.”

John lifted himself so that he might move downwards, familiarise himself a little more with the length of Sherlock’s body.

Lying flat on his back, Sherlock’s ribs were much more obvious. John applied a little pressure as he slid his hands down, so his fingers went _bump-bump-bump_ over each ridge of bone. Beneath his ribcage, though, his belly was flat and smooth, with just the faintest dusting of hair in a trail that began over his belly button. One scar indicated appendicitis, another remained a mystery.

Despite John’s previous efforts, Sherlock’s cock lay limp in his trimmed thatch of pubic hair. John attributed this state to nerves. He would only start to worry if Sherlock remained limp after he’d done what he was about to do. He placed his right hand so he was loosely cupping Sherlock’s cock and balls, and exhaled, long and hot, into this enclosed space. He did it once more, then leaned closer, just the fraction that was necessary to touch his tongue to it. Beneath his tongue-tip there was a little stir. His hand slowly closed its grip, so he could gently massage Sherlock’s balls with his fingers while pressing the shaft with the palm. The tip, he kissed with wetted lips. Somewhere off in the distance, Sherlock was sighing again.

Once he had gotten Sherlock half-hard, he lifted his hand and let the cock spring up. A wet, pink hint of the tip was peeking out from beneath the foreskin.  With just his thumb, John slid the foreskin back to reveal the beautiful, smooth, moist head. He gave in immediately to the urge to put it in his mouth. With a little suckling, he improved Sherlock’s erection dramatically. Sliding the head slowly, reluctantly, from his mouth, John then pressed his lips to the ridge, gave it a little kiss, and felt the foreskin slide just a fraction under his lower lip. He applied the slightest pressure, using his lip to push the foreskin back and forth just those few millimetres, over the ridge and back again. From there, he began concentrating on the bit that went from the sensitive spot just behind the head, up over the split of the underside, to the slit. As he put the flat of his tongue on the fraenulum, fluid welled in the slit, and John kissed it away.

Sherlock was moving his hips in a slow circle, at last actually indicating the rhythm and pressure of the touch he desired. Time to get serious now. John was not practiced at this, but he made an honest effort to fit as much of Sherlock in his mouth as he could, then used his hand to work the rest. When Sherlock bumped his soft palate, John was rewarded with a pitiful groan. John liked the idea of Sherlock’s body controlling his brain for once. It would make it easier to do the next thing on his list. He continued, careful never to swallow his saliva but letting it dribble down and further lubricate his hand.

His mouth would have to leave Sherlock for a moment, which he regretted, but with his right hand he could keep a hot, wet grip as he took the pump-bottle from the bedside table. He managed to curl his left hand around the top of it and use his palm to press the pump and dispense the lube onto his fingers. Meanwhile, Sherlock looked down and was momentarily fascinated by the flecks of spittle in his pubic hair.

John got himself back between Sherlock’s legs, doing exactly what he was doing before with his hand and mouth, but with the added push and rub of three fingers against Sherlock’s perineum. When Sherlock failed to make a noise of protest, his longest finger separated from the others and went exploring further down.

The slippery pad of his finger circled the opening, which seemed at ease and receptive. Sherlock rocked his hips just a touch, and made a noise like he wanted John in there. But when John pushed the finger in to the first knuckle, the muscle tried to slam shut; it was only the steeling of John’s wrist that kept him inside.

“Come on, none of that, now,” John scolded. “If you want me to stop, I’ll stop, but otherwise you have to let me in.”

“I can’t help it,” Sherlock whinged. He put his hands over his face, expressing abject shame in front of John for the first time that evening. Or rather, ever.

“It’s alright. It’s normal. Try bearing down,” John offered.

Sherlock pushed and John pushed, and the finger slid inside. “That’s the way,” John said, and slowly worked it in and out, slicking and massaging the muscle that continued to flex powerfully against invasion. For every clutch of it on John’s finger, there was a sympathetic twinge in his cock. This was going to require consideration and patience, but it was going to feel so, so sweet.

John didn’t want to rush, but he couldn’t help having a little feel around for the firm bump of Sherlock’s prostate.

When he found it, Sherlock’s moan was soaked with bewilderment.

 John’s smile was at once mischievous and triumphant. “You didn’t know you had a sweet spot?” he said. “Oh, of course, you probably deleted that information to make room for variables in the viscosity of the vitreous humour.”

“I stand by my priorities,” Sherlock croaked.

With Sherlock -- and the tight ring of muscle -- caught off guard, John was able to add a second finger, and used both to rub that bit of Sherlock’s insides, lightly but with vigour. In response, Sherlock delivered the unique grunt that can only be uttered by someone being penetrated -- someone on the cusp of reconciling the promise of pleasure with the reality of discomfort. His eyes became unfocused and he began to take strange breaths. “Can you press it harder?” he asked.

John didn’t think the result would be what Sherlock had in mind, but he said “Your wish,” and gave Sherlock’s prostate a single hard stroke.

He was lucky he didn’t end up having to scrape Sherlock off the ceiling. His whole body jolted and he cried out in agony. Then, immediately composing himself, Sherlock said, casually, “No, no, go back to the way you were doing it.”

Three of John’s fingers were now inside Sherlock, and if John could perceive how relaxed and stretched the muscle had become, Sherlock certainly could as well. John was ready to replace those fingers with his cock and show Sherlock how good that could feel. He slowly slipped them out, ignoring Sherlock’s woeful noise. “It’s alright,” he said, “you’re ready for the rest of me now.”

With his lube-slick hands he gripped both Sherlock’s thighs and hitched them up enough to get himself underneath. Despite his obvious agenda, he did take a moment to enjoy the sight below him; Sherlock’s pelvis tilted up, exposing the underside of his cock and balls, the slickened crease beneath, the shiny streaks where stray daubs of lube had smeared the inside of his thighs. And more stunning than that, up above, Sherlock’s face, and his neck and chest, all pink and glowing, his mouth slightly open, his lower lip quivering. John made a mental note: he would fuck that beautiful mouth, next time.

John tilted forward to mount Sherlock properly. He pressed his cock against Sherlock’s perineum and tried to line it up to push it in, but instead it slid all the way down between the cheeks of Sherlock’s arse, and a dollop of over-warmed lube dripped down onto the sheet below.

John looked down and gave a little huff, a self-deprecating laugh. “Reckon we used a bit too much lube.” When Sherlock was awkwardly silent, he continued, “It’s alright, we’ll soon have this sorted.” He tilted his head back up to look Sherlock in the eye and smile, sheepishly; a “we’re all in this together” smile. Sherlock did his best to smile back, cooperatively.

“Don’t. Don’t do that.” John snapped.

“Don’t what?”

“That fake smiling. You can do that to anyone else you want, you can even do it to me, anyplace else. But when we’re together like this, your smile goes all the way up to your eyes or don’t bother. Got it?”

Sherlock closed his eyes, like not faking smiles was a chore. But beneath John, his body arched and trembled. “Understood.”

“Good. Now hold still.” With cock in hand, John started his route over, pressing just behind Sherlock’s balls and pushing as he slid down, slowly and more carefully this time, until he felt himself sink in a little. “Oh Christ,” he whispered, then pushed harder. As his cock dipped in, he took his hand away, little by little, until he had it between just thumb and forefinger. Oh yes, he was in now, for certain. Sherlock made an indeterminate squeaking noise.

“Listen to me,” John said. “You’re in charge of this. Harder, softer, faster, slower, more, stop. You say the word.”

Sherlock nodded through an exhalation. “More. Slowly.”

Now that his cock was properly seated, John took his hand away and planted it next to Sherlock’s shoulder. With their bodies symmetrical and their eyes locked, he could now arch his back, roll his hips, and push all of his cock inside.

“Dear God,” Sherlock grunted, and his head rolled to the right.

“Ah-ah-ah,” John scolded, and raised one hand briefly to grip Sherlock’s chin and restore their eye contact. “Not yet. Keep looking at me. Just another minute. I’m enjoying this.” He slowly pulled out, until he could feel the grip of Sherlock’s body around only the crown of his cock, then pushed in again, more insistently this time, and with a little bit of an angle. Beyond the tight ring of muscle, Sherlock was quite roomy inside, so John made long strokes, letting the whole length of him feel the squeeze of it.

Sherlock kept his eyes open now, but only, John suspected, because if he closed them, John might think him weak. Those eyes could not seem to decide if they wanted to communicate awe or stubbornness.

Sherlock tilted his pelvis to get more comfortable and John sank deeper unexpectedly. He had to break the eye contact, to round his shoulders and curl in on himself for a second, feeling out the new depth. He’d thought he was all the way in but he’d been mistaken. He could hardly believe this was happening. Sherlock was warm and twitching, inside and out. He had accepted John this way. It was so crushingly intimate.

John’s thrusts became more rhythmic, more confident. He was using all his best moves: a rotation of his pelvis here, a flick of his tongue there. But with each stroke, the noises Sherlock made became fainter, more sporadic, less interested. It became gradually apparent that he and Sherlock were moving in opposite directions. When John arched his back and lowered his belly, he could feel that Sherlock’s cock had gone soft.

“Er, hello?”

“Hm?” Sherlock perked up a little, faced John, and hummed like one who had been snapped out of a daydream.

“It feels really good,” John said. “I think I’d like to come soon, I was just wondering if you were close?”

Sherlock looked down, then back at John, as if searching for clues to the answer. “I don’t know.”

“You don’t know. Is everything alright?”

“I’m sorry, I got distracted. I was thinking about Kevin Eadon.”

“Who the bloody hell is Kevin Eadon?” John sat up suddenly, and Sherlock’s body seized as the angle of John’s cock changed inside him.

“He was arrested in Caterham last week,” Sherlock yelped, then, when he’d calmed somewhat, continued:  “On suspicion of having murdered his brother-in-law two hours previously. Eadon claimed he was eating sushi in Croydon at the time of the murder. He didn’t have a receipt, and no one at the restaurant remembered him, so the police ignored his alibi. It only just occurred to me: there is no sushi restaurant within thirty minutes of Caterham. If Eadon had indeed been eating sushi three hours before his interrogation, we could have administered a purgative, analyzed the contents of his stomach, and possibly proven that he was at least eight miles away when the murder occurred.” Sherlock lifted his head a touch, only to slam it back against the pillow. “Stupid! We had a chance and lost it.”

“You’re telling me that you haven’t been paying attention to what we’ve been doing here--”

Sherlock’s eyes narrowed on John, chiding him for having the nerve to take that tone. “Don’t be angry with me. You know this is who I am.”

“Oh, well I am so sorry to have bored you. It’s just that I am up here making -- can I just say -- the sweetest, tenderest love I have ever made to anyone, ever, and you’re thinking about how you should have forced a man to vomit in case it came up bluefin tuna!”

“I said I’m sorry. No -- don’t go!” As John attempted to disengage, Sherlock clutched at him, with both arms on his shoulders and one leg round his thighs. His prior rebuke evaporated, and a little desperate affection slipped out before he could regain himself. “I can think about it later. It doesn’t matter now anyway. Just -- continue.” He reclined again, wriggled a little to make it clear that intended to settle in and make an honest effort. “Keep doing it how you were doing it. Maybe a little harder?”

“Oh, no,” John said. “I tried putting you in charge, and look what happened. I forgive you, but your being-in-charge privileges have been revoked. Now you’re going to do what I say.” These words didn’t come easily -- John had to spit them out or he knew they wouldn’t come at all. But as soon as he had, he knew he’d done the right thing. He felt Sherlock’s cock surge between their bellies, and he recalled the arch of Sherlock’s back and spark in his eye when John had forbid his fake-smiling. It seemed so obvious now. Sherlock needed to be bossed around if you wanted to hold his interest. If only John had known this forty minutes ago. Then again, perhaps Sherlock hadn’t known it forty minutes ago, either.

“You’re going to pay attention to _us_ now. I want you to just...think out loud. Observe what we’re doing and tell me about it. Can you do that?”

“I’m told that’s what I’m best at.”

“Yes, and usually by someone who is extremely irritated by you at the moment. So what am I doing now?”

“You’re -- inside me.”

“And what am I _doing_?”

“You’re...thrusting.” Sherlock’s hesitation was certainly not due to a lack of perception. Something else was holding him back. John just needed to knock it loose. And he had the means, now.

“You can do better than that. Come on, tell me what I’m doing.”

“You’re --” Enraged at his own confusion and timidity, Sherlock finally snarled, “You’re pushing your prick up into me!”

His words went right to the core of John, made his guts churn. “Oh, you’re good at that. Tell me how it feels.”

“It feels good.” Sherlock opened his eyes, revealed them to still be lively with thought. “Which it ought to, as the most sensitive part of you is rubbing the most sensitive part of me.”

Technically it was what he’d asked for, but John thought that was too articulate to be allowed to continue. He tucked his knees in so he could sit up straighter, take the weight off one hand and use it to stroke Sherlock’s cock. Shifting had the unintended but pleasant effect of pushing himself more deeply into Sherlock, who groaned and twisted beneath him. “More now,” John said. “Tell me what I’m doing.”

It was a tall order to ask Sherlock to speak now. Every word was an effort, so when he did get things out, they were delightfully forceful.

“You’re touching my prick. _Mmmhh_...”

“Go on.”

“You’re fucking me and you’ve got my prick in your hand. _Fff_...ah...You’re fucking me, John. You’re fucking me.”

“Now what am I doing?”

“You’re pushing my -- pushing my legs up.”

“And using your extraordinary powers of deduction, can you guess why?”

“ _Unh_ , so you can put it in deeper.”

“Well done.” John was pumping hard now, without mercy. “What else? Can you tell me anything else that’s going on?”

“ _Ohh_ I can’t think of anything else but that!”

_Excellent._

John could feel it already, beneath him; the rhythmic writhing of Sherlock’s body becoming rapid and uncontrolled. His cock jerking in John’s hand. “John! I’m coming! I’m coming _I’m coming_ _ohhh_...” John continued his relentless pace, cock and hand both, until Sherlock’s jolts became squirms of discomfort. With his dark curls stuck to his damp forehead, his whole body shimmering with perspiration, he had never looked so beautiful.

As he took away his sticky hand, John cooed, “Look at you. You did so good. God, look at you.” Slow as he was now going, John couldn’t will his hips to stop entirely. “It’s my turn now, okay? I’m going to tell you what’s going on. Are you ready for me to finish?” He waited a moment, took Sherlock’s exhausted hum for a “Yes.”

“You’re so relaxed now. I can just, mmm, I can just fuck you so easily.” He gazed down on Sherlock, panting and flushed. “You’re all pink, all across here.” He bent one arm to spread a hand across Sherlock’s chest, up to his neck, the heel sliding through fresh sweat. “You just look freshly fucked. It’s magnificent. I’m gonna come now. I’m gonna come as deep inside you as I can.”

“Oh God, John.”

Pushing himself up snugly against Sherlock’s arse, John snapped his hips, five, six, seven times, short but powerful thrusts, and made good on his promise, groaning "Oh, yes. _Yes_.”

As his orgasm ebbed away, John’s brain went sluggish. The exhaustion that had been creeping up, stealing into his muscles, snaking into his mind, now hit him like a freight train. He wanted to collapse and sleep where he fell (that is, on Sherlock), but duty kept his limbs steady. He considered it his responsibility to make certain that Sherlock was clean and comfortable before they fell asleep.

“There’s a fresh towel on the floor by the bed,” John said. “Can you grab it?”

Sherlock flung one slender arm over the edge of the bed and felt about until he came up with the towel. He handed it to John, who swiped it across Sherlock’s chest and against the insides of his thighs, then dabbed more delicately as he pressed inwards. With both thumbs, he spread the cheeks of Sherlock’s arse once more to check for signs of ill use, and found none. He used a dry corner of the towel to wipe down his own sweaty face and chest and cock, then dropped it on the floor and rolled to Sherlock’s side.

“You must be sore,” he said. “I’m sorry about that.”

Sherlock was smiling. A real, real, real smile. “I can’t feel a thing. I’m still high as a kite.”

With his last moments of consciousness, John voiced his most pressing concern. “This feels so good, right now, but what’s going to happen when the endorphins and adrenalin wear off?”

Sherlock appeared unfazed by the prospect. “We’ll do the same thing we’ve been doing: try to find something to get the adrenalin and endorphins flowing again.”

“Mmm…Have I told you lately that you’re brilliant?”

 

*****

 

When John awoke, it was still quite dark out. The clock said 0329. He couldn’t have been asleep more than an hour. The first instant he heard the violin coming from downstairs, his instinct was to seethe, but in the next moment he realised that there was no need to. This time the sound was sweet, mellifluous.

As John padded softly down the stairs, there was a brief silence, and then he heard the same musical phrase again, then a third time with a few more notes at the end. Then more silence. 

The sitting room curtains were open, allowing the rusty light of the street lamps to flood in. Sherlock stood facing the window, silhouetted against this orange illumination. His dressing gown was open, and the loose ties swung back and forth as he swayed slightly to his own melody, careful to avoid the nearby music stand. He did not acknowledge John’s presence for a good ten minutes, just played fragmented melodies which were by turn tender and piercing, heavy on the vibrato and portamento, and which tugged at John’s heart.

When at last Sherlock let the bow fall to his side, John waited a beat and then said softly, “What’s the matter? You didn’t want to stay in bed with me?”

“I needed to write,” Sherlock said.

“It doesn’t sound like you’re writing.”

Without looking in his direction, Sherlock turned the music stand around for John to see. It was tilted slightly toward the ceiling, so that the orange light could fall on a sheet that was half-blank, half covered in scribbles. John more or less recognised the strokes and dots as musical notation.

John approached Sherlock carefully, as he’d learned from experience that when the violin was out of its case, it was often better to keep his distance. But Sherlock just stood and waited for him, bow at one side, instrument at the other. John got close enough that he could see the collar of Sherlock’s t-shirt shift minutely with each breath he took. He did not look at Sherlock’s face; it felt just as intimate, if not more so, to watch the powerful pulse in his neck.

John said, “Those vibratos gave me shivers.”

Sherlock said, “Me too.”


End file.
